


Wunderkammer

by purplebowties



Series: In The Realm Of The Basses [8]
Category: Gossip Girl
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 09:19:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17139140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplebowties/pseuds/purplebowties
Summary: Blair sat crossed legs on the plush carpet of her walk-in closet, right in front of the pear white wall-safe armoire she had hurriedly walked over to as soon as she had entered the room. Longing to be in the company of the object she now held in her hands, she had kicked off her Vivier heels, opened the armoire's bottom section doors, kneeled down in front of it and pressed her index finger over the biometric reader to unlock the safe; at last, she had opened the lowest drawer and, heaving a sigh of relief, she had smiled





	Wunderkammer

 

* * *

 

 **AN:**  Hello to all my faithful readers - if you're still here after all this time, you must truly be faithful - and merry Christmas. I sincerely apologize for my long disappearance. It's been a tough, long year for my writing. This one-shot is the first thing I managed to finish in about 13 months. Things, however, are starting to get better and I'm confident that, from now on, I'll be able to post more often. Enjoy your reading, and don't forget to look at the end of the story for notes and details. I always appreciate reviews. Once again, happy holidays! Cris.

* * *

 

**Wunderkammer:**

Blair Waldorf Bass hadn't had a good day. It had started off poorly that morning, when the croissants she had ordered for breakfast had been served to her slightly burnt, and ended just as unpleasantly, with the always irritating experience of getting caught in the traffic her driver hadn't been able to avoid. In between, there had been all sorts of unpleasant occurrences: some coffee accidentally spilled on her Gucci shirt by Jennifer's assistant, the unexpected and infuriating news that the fabric samples which were supposed to be ready the day before still hadn't been delivered, a text from Chuck saying he couldn't take their usual lunch break call, and, at last, an afternoon spent stuck in a meeting with the financial team.

Usually, however, none of these peeves would have mattered once back home. On a normal day, crossing the front door of her townhouse, Blair would have left all of her frustration outside; she would have forgotten about the bitter taste of overcooked pastry and the stain on the pink silk  _crepe de chine_ ; she would have told herself she could have waited till tomorrow to see a model of the Belle Époque inspired pattern the designing team had come up with for the spring line finally printed on satin and then reminded herself it didn't matter if Chuck hadn't been able to speak to her a few hours before, because she would have soon seen him in person and, together with their son, they would have enjoyed a nice dinner and each other's company.

But this was no regular day. No day had been quite normal ever since last Sunday, when Henry had got on the Bass family jet and left New York to go visit his grandparents in France. Fifteen years old Henry Waldorf-Bass had obviously traveled alone before – and not every vacation had been as worry-free for his mother as a week spent at her father's chateaux – and yet Blair couldn't get used to the feeling that he wasn't under the roof of their safe home.

Over the years, she had grown accustomed to missing Chuck when he was away on business. It had been a necessity and, though his absence always bothered her a little, with time she had become better at coping with temporary distance and separation. When it came to Henry, however, she wasn't as ready, nor as rational; and missing him made every single moment of annoyance brought by the usual hustle of her typically full days seem intolerable.

Indeed, that evening, when she closed the heavy front door behind her and stepped into the foyer of her house, she found no relief to her irritability. Actually, as she carefully scanned the room to check if everything had been properly cleaned and tied up, the only feeling that caught her was a pang of nostalgia, which almost brought tears to her eyes when her gaze met the family portrait hung on the wall behind the Louis XIV style console table. Eight years old painted Henry was smirking down at her and Blair felt a sudden, piercing longing for having him in her arms. Her son wasn't fond of hugs anymore (he liked to show her affection with playful jokes these days and with the gentlemanly, charming way of complimenting her he had so successfully learnt from his father), but she would have surely won his resistance and pulled him into the tightest of embraces on Sunday night, when, as planned, he would have returned.

Blair only averted her stare from the painting when she heard Dorota's footsteps behind her. She turned and watched her maid come down the grand staircase and then towards her. "Good evening, Dorota," she greeted her distractedly.

"Good evening, Miss Blair," Dorota replied with a smile. "How was your day?"

The question made Blair roll her eyes, as she took off her coat. "Dreadful," she answered. The dramatic statement was accompanied by a swift movement and, in a moment, a puff of white cashmere ended up on the maid's already stretched out arms. "We're late with the spring line development, which I'm sure my mother will be thrilled to know."

Folding the coat properly to get it ready to be hung, Dorota shook her head. "Mrs. Eleanor too busy with Mr. Henry to criticize."

Blair heaved a long sigh. Her mother and her step-father were at the chateaux as well; the week had been organized so that Henry had the chance to spend time with all his grandparents. "That might be true," she admitted, as she handed her briefcase to the maid as well. "All that spoiling takes effort and attention."

Eleanor had been the strictest of business women just as she was still a strict mother to her daughter, but she inevitably lost all of her firmness when it came to her only grandson. The entire Waldorf-Bass extended family did, truth to be told. Blair was absolutely sure that both her parents and their husbands were devoting that week to shamelessly lavish gifts on their  _petit prince_  – Harold had been the one to come up with that sugary nickname when he had first seen newborn Henry and, somehow, much to Chuck's dismay, the epithet had stuck.

The idea made Blair grow irrationally jealous and, for the split of a second, she couldn't stop herself from wishing Henry hadn't accepted his grandparents' invitation, so he'd be there with her. She was just as capable of making him happy, she wondered, conceding herself the silent relief of an illogical and thus unspoken vent; happier, in fact: she was his mother.

"I'm sure Mr. Henry misses you too, Miss Blair," Dorota told her in an unusually gentle voice tone, as she walked over to the hall closet.

Once again, realizing that the shade of bitterness in her words hadn't passed unnoticed, Blair found herself rolling her eyes. "He misses Chuck," she retorted, something in between saddened and irritated. "Lately, I'm merely the prude mother who refuses to indulge his womanizing ways."

* * *

 

Hanging the coat, Dorota grumbled something in Polish and the remark managed to made Blair smile; not because she had understood the words, but because she knew well enough that her maid only used Polish to express disapproval. At least, Blair told herself, she wasn't the only one in the house having a hard time adapting to the fact Henry wasn't an innocent boy anymore.

She was, however, the one who had taken the longest to realize it. For months before what Chuck liked to refer to as  "the pool accident", Blair had systematically ignored both the obvious signs before her eyes and her husband's attempts to make her face them. Her denial had been so complete and obstinate that she had even ended up taking the blame for the lipstick stains on the collars Henry's school shirts, imputing them to her tight good morning hugs. On July, however, her refusal to see the reality of things had shattered in front of a direct, inescapable and shocking experience.

On the night "the pool accident" had occurred, Chuck and Blair had come back to their Hamptons villa from a charity gala they had attended far earlier than they had planned to. Chuck, who had just got back that morning from a business trip and was jet-lagged, had started getting a headache and so they had left the party while it was still in full swing.

Once back at the house, Blair had asked her husband to go check on Henry, as she went to the kitchen to get him a glass of water and an aspirin. Their son had indeed told them he had declined an invitation to a beach party and decided to stay in instead; he wanted to watch a movie, he had said. If Blair thought about it now, she could easily see how improbable it sounded, but, back then, Henry's words hadn't left her without any shade of suspicion; she had imagined they would have found him downstairs in the cinema room, in the company of a bucket of popcorns and the restored version of _The Godfather_ series. She had been terribly wrong.

Entering the kitchen, Blair had immediately noticed that the lights in the back garden were on and she had frowned. Security hadn't warned them of any unusual activity, so it had to be Henry. Blair had moved to the tall windows which looked onto the porch to get a closer look, asking herself what her son was doing by the pool at that hour; it was past eleven p.m. and she couldn't come up with a good reason why he would still be there. Perplexed and a little worried, Blair had slid the French doors open and walked to the balcony that overlooked the pool. Leaning on the balustrade, she had finally realized the light came from the pool-side pergola and she had quickly climbed down the stairs to go greet her son and find out the reason why he wasn't inside.

She hadn't had the need nor the time to ask. The reason had presented itself to her clearly as soon as her feet had touched the marble floor that framed the pool: Henry wasn't alone; shirtless, he sat on one of the chaises and on his lap was an equally shirtless girl – a girl that, she would have soon found out, wasn't even his girlfriend. All she and Henry had was a fling, one of the many he had had since spring.

As the image came back to her memory, the faint smile curling Blair's lips disappeared. Her relationship with Henry hadn't quite been the same since that moment; though she couldn't say they weren't close (they were, closer than she had been to both her parents at Henry's age), Blair felt as if the way she looked at him had changed in an irreversible way. She could no longer hold on to the reassuring fantasy her son was still her child. He wasn't a child, he was a teenager, and he wasn't hers either. There was a whole part of his life she was excluded from and that idea gave her the most violent fear of losing him. Adjusting to such an ever-present anxiety had made Blair turn stricter and more possessive than she had ever been; though she had always been a little jealous of Henry and never as liberal as Chuck in his education, the past few months had definitely undermined her balance. It was February and she still couldn't completely accept the change in Henry's life, nor how it had forced her to modify the idea she had of him– or at least to expand it.

"I'm going upstairs," she told her maid at last. She needed to relax, she realized, and to be alone with her thoughts for a little while. "Tell Chuck I'll be waiting for him in our bedroom when he gets back."

Dorota nodded, as she closed the wardrobe. She made no comments about how Blair usually liked to wait for her husband downstairs and welcome him with a drink, and Blair felt thankful her maid had pretended not to notice that small diversion from her habit. She smiled at her as she walked past her and hastily made her way to the elevator. She knew just what to do to ease her sadness.

* * *

 

Five minutes later, Blair sat crossed legs on the plush carpet of her walk-in closet, right in front of the pear white wall-safe armoire she had hurriedly walked over to as soon as she had entered the room. Longing to be in the company of the object she now held in her hands, she had kicked off her Vivier heels, opened the armoire's bottom section doors, kneeled down in front of it and pressed her index finger over the biometric reader to unlock the safe; at last, she had opened the lowest drawer and, heaving a sigh of relief, she had smiled.

The safe armoire housed a selection of Blair's most valuable jewels; there she kept the ones she used more often and the ones she was most attached to. They were all gift from Chuck, a priceless collection that had come together during their seventeen years of marriage and that he kept expanding at the rhythm of both meaningful occasions and unexpected surprises. Not once, ever since she and Chuck had gotten married, Blair had bought herself a piece of jewelry; not because she couldn't, but because there was a silent pact between her and Chuck which had set the rule that precious stones and metals were his to give. It was a tradition dearly cherished by them both: to Chuck it was a matter of pride, while to her it was a matter of vanity; an old-fashioned habit that fed his ego immensely and gave Blair the sweet pleasure of being adulated through the grandest gifts. Over the years, both the armoire and the safe-room in basement had filled with custom jewels thought and made to be worn solely by her, with vintage and antique pieces won at auctions so that she could bring them back to life and with every ring, necklace, bracelet, earrings or brooch Chuck had considered magnificent and unique enough to show the world that she was Blair Bass.

The most valuable object stored in the armoire, however, wasn't a jewel, but a precious secret Chuck had never found out about; in fact, the immeasurable worth it had to Blair laid exactly in the fact that her husband was completely unaware of it. That secret was open on Blair's lap in that very moment: a photo album that, just as the jewelry collection, had been regularly nourished with pictures over the past seventeen years.

It was a very simple yet elegant album, hardbound in ivory calf leather and lined with moiré silk in vibrant ruby red. Blair had bought it almost two decades ago, intentioned to fill it with the photographs she and Chuck had taken during their honeymoon spent travelling across Europe. Her purchase had been driven by the most intense travel nostalgia, but it had soon become clear to Blair that the destiny of the album's gilt-edged pages wasn't to collect journey memories.

Her realization had come only a few days after her return to New York, during a brunch date with Serena. Her best friend had decided that their reunion, after a month of not seeing each other and only a few phone conversations, had to be celebrated with a gift: she had had the pictures she had taken during Chuck and Blair's wedding printed and gathered into a gold foil-lined envelope. "So you can have some of them framed," Serena had explained with a smile.

She had been mostly right. A picture from the ceremony, the one that captured Chuck and Blair's first kiss as a married couple, had been set in a silver frame, which still was in their living room, along with other family photos; a few other pictures from the reception, instead, graced the desks of the Basses in their offices at Waldorf Designs and Bass industries.

Blair, however, had kept one picture to herself. It was the one she was now running her fingers over, an enamored smile stretching her lips; the first picture of her secret album, the one she had built her collection over.

It was a shot of Chuck that never missed to move her. Even now, years after that late morning she had seen it for the first time, she couldn't resist to its charm; it always brought tears to her eyes, just as it had back then. Chuck was alone in the photo, dressed in the white, light blue bordered suit he had never worn again after the day of their wedding. He sat on the living room couch of Eleanor's penthouse, gazing at something that, taking the picture, Serena had cut out of the framing.

That something was her, Blair had no doubts about it. Not even at first glance it had taken her longer than an instant to realize that she had to be the thing he was staring at so intensely, for she had the absolute certainness he would have never looked at anyone else with the same devotion and love. The mix of tenderness and admiration, tinged with a bit of surprise, which filled Chuck's dark gaze every time it rested on her was hardly the only privilege in Blair's life, but it was indeed the one she was most proud of. Chuck had made an armor of his impassible expression and weapons of the sardonic smirks that often creased his lips and of the piercing glances he liked to shoot, but Blair knew that his face was capable of showing gentleness. It did for her. She was the one it softened for, with loving stares and genuine, even timid smiles.

Looking at the picture, Blair had realized what a rare gem a glimpse of that hidden softness was and promised herself she would have tried to put together as many evidences of its existence as possible. The sight of him looking at her in awe had been revealing; it had given her the idea to turn the album into a shelter for moments that weren't special because of the context that had seen them happen, but because of their unique nature. Glued to the delicate leaves of white card were fragments of life Blair had felt the need to impress on paper, so they would have never slipped away from her memory; vivid, sharp images taken away from the inevitable, incessant blur of flowing time.

Not all of the pictures were moving; some of them were simple slices of everyday life. During the first months of their marriage, Blair had tried to capture not only Chuck's most tender side, but his intimacy as a spectrum; his most peculiar habits, passing glimpses of vulnerability, hints of his complicated inner reality: all the small things about him that were precluded to anyone but his wife. Their magic, the allure they held for Blair, came exactly from the fact that she was their only witness.

Leafing through the album's pages, Blair found herself giggling, sometimes affectionately, sometimes out of pure fun. Her fingers skimmed over pictures showing instants of privacy she had secretly stolen from her husband. There were photographs in which Chuck was asleep, which she had easily taken, for she always woke up before him and often fell asleep after; little bits of innocence he would have been ashamed of, but that she found captivating and heartwarming at the same time.

Other pictures had been harder conquests, captured in secrecy by taking advantage of his distraction, or by hiding behind doorframes. Among the many Blair had collected, there was a hilarious photo of Chuck that testified his almost obsessive vanity, where, caught in the middle of his daily beauty ritual, he was staring at his reflection in the mirror of his bathroom as he carefully rubbed some moisturizing cream over his cheeks. Another funny picture portrayed him in the act of talking to his first dog, Monkey, while in one of Blair's favorites, Chuck was smiling fondly at a newspaper article that talked about Nate. A couple of pages after, Blair also found a photo that brought a tad of sadness to her caring smile, as her eyes rested on the image of a young Chuck, sat at the desk of his home office; a focused, tense frown creased his frown with worry and his early days in charge of Bass Industries came back to Blair's mind, with all the anguishing self-doubt and the insecurities that they had brought him and that had been a challenge for her too. She lingered a moment longer on that picture before moving on, as a sudden feeling of pride pushed away the memory of that long gone melancholy: they had gotten through that difficult time, she thought with relief, just as they had overcome worse periods and higher hurdles after.

The album kept offering Blair beautiful domestic shots for a few minutes more, till she finally found the photograph she loved the most from this group of printed moments that spanned her first year of marriage to Chuck. Of all the pictures she had taken as a young bride, the one that was now under her gaze was the one that always caused her the most immediate and powerful surge of affection for her husband. It was also probably the most private and, for this very reason, the most secret. Blair knew for a fact that if Chuck had seen it and understood she was responsible for it its existence, he would have gotten terribly offended and surely refused to talk to her for days.

He wouldn't have been wrong; even Blair felt a pinch of guilt when she thought back to the moment she had taken that picture, and the fact that, staring at it, she couldn't hold back soft giggles pricked her conscience even more. She knew it had been a betrayal of his trust, probably a worse crime than the ones she had committed with all the previous photographs; yet, she hadn't been able to control herself, for the expression on his face was too uncharacteristically soft and compliant not to be fixed and framed in an indelible image.

In the picture, Chuck was lying in bed on his side, with head rested on a pile of two pillows. In between his legs was another cushion, squeezed under the weight of his arm; it wasn't visible in the photo, for his entire figure, with the only exception of his face, was covered by heavy blankets, but Blair knew it was there because, up to a minute before she had raised her phone slightly and taken the shot, she had been the pillow he had been clinging too, mumbling and moaning weakly as she slowly stroked his hair. The moment she had decided that she needed to get up and get him some water, Chuck had replaced her with the first soft thing he had been able to find without spending too many energies in a movement. Back then he had been sick with a nasty case of the flu for two days, during which Blair had dedicated each minute of her time at home to nursing him. It had been a quite trying experience, for Chuck happened to be the most stubborn, immature and dramatic man when he wasn't feeling well, but, in some ways, Blair also remembered it with tenderness and with a certain pleasure. She had always loved taking care of him; there was something in the way he'd always accept her help and then abandoned himself to her devoted, patient concern, that made her feel special. She was absolutely sure she was the only one who had ever seen him so exposed; not even their son had a precise idea of how clingy and dependent his father could be in certain situations.

Though that hadn't certainly been the last time Chuck had been sick over the years, Blair had never taken another picture of him in such circumstances. She was so attached to the one she already had that, after it, she never felt the need to add a similar one to the album. Tired, half-closed eyes and fever-flushed cheeks, the Chuck in the picture had the pout and the vulnerability of a child, as he looked absentmindedly to his side, unaware of the fact his wife had stopped on her way to the door to give him the most gentle, maternal smile and then to make sure that such an extremely rare, amusing and delicate instant of fragility didn't get lost in oblivion.

Blair took another moment to run her thumb lightly over the printed image before turning the page again and immersing herself in the next part of the album. Though there were no signs that it was divided in segments, no pages left blank and no bookmarks, the album was organized in her mind as if in sections; and that last picture of Chuck closed the chapter of their life \without Henry.

The next photo was indeed Chuck and Blair's first as parents. It was one of the very few in Blair's secret collection where she actually appeared, as it was also one of the few she hadn't taken herself. The picture, where she and Chuck stood alone, portrayed in profile, was from the first New Year's Eve party they had hosted at their chalet in Lech am Arlberg, back in 2013. It had been on that year that they had started their tradition of inviting their extended family to spend the winter holidays with them in Austria.

Blair had especially vivid memories of the first night of 2014. She remembered the music she had selected to be played at the party, the color palette she had picked for the decorations and the table settings – white and gold – and the pale champagne Armani Privé couture gown she had worn; she remembered the weight of Chuck's Christmas gift hanging at her neck, the Buccellati Ambrosia collier that was now safely nested in its box and locked in a drawer of her armoire, and how its yellow gold, pearls and diamonds had shimmered with the flamboyant, bright colors of the fireworks she and Chuck had watched from behind the living room tall windows, while their family enjoyed the show outside on the balcony.

Most of all, though, Blair had clear in her mind the memory of Chuck's arms around her waist and his hands placed on her stomach; not seductive as they always were when they rested on her, but hesitant and delicate as if held back by the sudden fear of hurting her. Though all through her pregnancy Chuck had never really lost that somewhat frightened shyness, in the days that had immediately followed the moment she had told him they were expecting a baby, Blair remembered that he barely managed to touch her; his fingers would only skim over her body, trembling with dread and joy, feathers over crystal, longing to be trapped in her hold and reassured.

She recalled they were cold in the moment the picture had been taken; and she remembered such a small detail because the photographer they had hired for the party had caught her in the act of cupping his hands with hers. Blair had pressed his palms against the fabric of her dress and they had both looked down to their fingers, waved tightly over her still flat belly; she had grinned, while the corners of Chuck's lips had curled in a smile that was too incredulous and timorous to be wide, but still full of happiness and hope for the future she had revealed him only the day before, when she had showed him a positive pregnancy test. Back then Blair hadn't seen a doctor yet – she would have, two days later, once back in New York, and her blood work would have confirmed she was indeed expecting – but she still could easily recall how confident she had been when she had told her husband they were going to be parents.

During the following months, Blair hadn't been able to take pictures of Chuck, mostly because she had hardly ever caught him off guard; whenever they were together, his gaze would never cease to follow her, always attentive, always clouded by uncontainable concern. In the only photo Blair had of him from that period, Chuck was sleeping with his hands on her baby bump, as if, even in his sleep, he hadn't been able to give up on his need to watch over her and their still unborn baby boy. Blair couldn't remember a moment of her pregnancy in which she had seen Chuck truly relaxed; back then he had become protective to the limit of being paranoid.

And yet no trace of anxiety darkened his expression in the photograph Blair laid her eyes on next. There was nothing but pure bliss on Chuck's face, as he held their two days old newborn son to his chest, his nose sunk into Henry's thin, dark hair and the most serene smile creasing his lips; a dreamy beam Blair had never seen before on his face, one he had never given her. She had taken the picture without any sort of jealousy for that new, exclusive smile that, for once, wasn't her privilege; instead she had shot it with eyes glistening from moved, overjoyed tears. She hadn't even needed to be careful. Completely absorbed by Henry, Chuck hadn't seen Blair grabbing her phone from the nightstand in her private hospital room and then pointing its camera towards him and the baby. He had remained still on the chair, unaware of everything besides the relief of having Henry back in his arms, after the long two hours it had taken him to go home, shower and change before coming back to his family.

That photograph, which was a beautiful close up on Chuck's slightly bent head and Henry's tiny face, wasn't secret anymore. It had remained secret for only half an hour, the time it had taken Blair to realize she couldn't be selfish with such a moment of utter happiness. She couldn't keep it to herself, she had thought, because there was at least another person who deserved to see it and, looking at it, to shed a tear of joy.

The picture now occupied the central place on the console table that housed family photos in Lily's penthouse; enlarged and framed in Tiffany silver, it towered over all the others like a trophy that had been hard to conquer, one to be immensely proud of. It was, to Lily, the testimony of the part she had played in the building of that image of happiness and fulfillment, when, years before, she had chosen to make Chuck her son. The first time Chuck had seen it, he had smiled shyly and put his gratitude into a timid silence of acceptance; he would have never asked Lily to remove because, Blair had been able to tell, that display of love pleased him. It was the only photo from Blair's album that he was aware of.

From that point on, the album changed, both in its content and in its purpose, for Chuck and Blair's life had inevitably transformed after Henry's birth. Their son had revolutionized their world and took the place at its center; a small despot sitting on the throne they had built for him, adapting to his needs and gushing over every tiny detail of his appearance, of his gestures and of his character. The pictures pasted to the pages Blair was turning now were a proof of how deep and definitive the change had been: shots of Chuck alone, after that first picture she had taken of him and Henry, were hard to find, lost in the middle of all the many photographs that portrayed father and son together. Once Henry had come into their lives, catching her husband in intimate moments that didn't include their son as well had become extremely difficult for Blair, since most of Chuck's domestic life had begun to revolve around the baby. It had been because of this reason that she had started to put together pictures of Chuck and Henry; eventually, image after image, her collection had ended up telling the tale of their son's growth and of how Chuck had carefully followed every step of that journey.

He was a wonderful father and the photos showed it in the most accurate and powerful way. They exposed his tenderness, his loving ways and the calm delicacy of his attention; and more importantly, the pictures were a demonstration of how natural and effortless his bond with Henry was. Peeks into home life, they told about Chuck and Henry's habits, about the small routines they had together.

In Blair's favorite shot of them together, they were both fast asleep in Henry's room, Chuck curled up by his son's side in the minuscule portion of matrass the kid had left for him, his arm hanging over the edge of the castle shaped bed Henry had kept all through the early years of his childhood. Except for the jacket, Chuck was still dressed in the suit he had worn all day, his tie slightly loosened and the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up to his elbows. On the floor was the book he had been reading to Henry, a copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales, which had probably slipped away from his hold when he had dozed off.

It was a sweet photo, the capture of a single, simple moment that described perfectly the kind of life that had always been granted to Henry: overflowing with affection and care, comforting and joyful. Blair remembered she had taken it with her heart bursting with love, but with no surprise: she had gone to their son's bedroom knowing that exact, picture-perfect scene would have presented itself before her eyes. She had predicted it the moment Chuck had come back home, exhausted after a day of work that had ended past dinner time, and yet ignored her when she had suggested her to go straight to bed; instead he had picked Henry up and together they had gone upstairs, ready for the kid's bedtime routine. After having waited for Chuck to come to bed for about forty minutes, Blair had realized that, as she had imagined when she had watched father and son disappear behind the elevator doors, her husband had once again fallen asleep as he waited for Henry to. It was something that used to happen rather often back then, because Chuck, no matter how tired he was, never missed to tuck their son in if he was home. In the photograph Henry was five, but Blair recalled perfectly that Chuck hadn't given up on that habit until at least two years later. Before waking him gently to save him from the backache sleeping in that position would have caused him, Blair had stopped on the doorway and shot the picture, feeling unspeakably thankful.

It was out of mere sense of possess that Blair kept this kind of photographs secret: Chuck wouldn't have been ashamed of them, for there was never restrain in his way of approaching Henry; he was always full of affection, always enamored, whether they were in public or in the privacy of their home. Blair didn't want to share those stolen moments with anyone not because they were exceptional, but for the opposite reason: she felt the need to keep some of that absolute, blatant love to herself. Part of it, Blair always thought whenever she found herself paying a visit to her album, belonged to her. There was nothing that made her feel prouder than looking at Chuck and Henry and realizing her family existed because she had been brave enough to believe in Chuck and in herself, in the strength of their love. It had been also through that love, through her care and her patience, that her husband and found the balance to be the father he was today – and that he had been to Henry from the very first day.

That deep sense of pride and serenity remained with Blair for the following quarter of hour, as she kept on paging through her album and finding pictures that made her feel warmer and lighter. When she reached the last photo, she was completely relaxed; no heavy melancholy weighted on her chest anymore and the bad day she had been through had become a distant, weak memory, compared to all the dear ones she had just relieved.

Glued to the bottom of the page her fingers were keeping slightly lifted, the most recent picture she had taken made Blair's lips stretch into a wide smile. She had shot it on a Saturday morning, a couple of months before. Once back home from her weekly shopping tour appointment with Serena, Blair had taken the elevator directly to the fourth floor, headed to Chuck's office, where she knew she would have found him and Henry busy with their recently established habit for weekend mornings: after breakfast, together they'd go over the details of past Bass Industries projects. Henry's interest in business definitely wasn't new; he had been fascinated by it since childhood and Chuck had always encouraged that natural inclination by feeding his son's curiosity with explanations that, over the years, had progressively become less generic and more exhaustive. It had been only at the beginning of that fall, however, that Chuck had finally convinced himself it was time to allow Henry to get the proper, specific lessons he had been asking for since the end of the past school year.

When Blair had entered Chuck's home office, he and Henry were sitting at the desk, folders full of copies of documents scattered all over the black marble tabletop. "I see some of your employees spent their Friday night buried inside Bass Industries archives," she had commented, crossing the doorway.

Both father and son had looked up at her, the same oblique, smug smirk creasing their lips. "And gladly, I imagine," Henry had commented, toying with the silver pen he had in hand. "It was probably the peak of their dull week."

Chuck had chortled at the joke – and, inevitably, so had Blair – before asking her about her morning. He hadn't, however, paid much attention to her answer. Though Blair's tale about Serena's latest dating adventure (a twenty-seven years old indie musician, who had turned out to be gay) was fun and certainly deserved at least one of his caustic remarks, Chuck had dismissed it with a distracted nod and an unusually neutral "I see", picking up a manila folder from the desk. Watching him as he underlined something he clearly meant to show Henry, Blair had sighed, rolled her eyes and then resignedly announced to the Bass men she would have had the staff bring them lunch, for she was well aware that there was no way they would have left the room anytime soon.

Chuck had uttered an absent-minded thanks and then slid the few papers he had in hand under Henry's inquiring gaze. He had questions, Blair had understood it from the small frown on his forehead, and taken his focused face as her clue to leave and let her husband go on with his lecture.

On her way out, however, she had stopped by the door to look back at them. It hadn't taken her longer than an instant to decide that she had to take a picture to capture their expressions. There was something indescribably beautiful about Henry's absorbed look and about the way he stared at his father, as he went into the details of an acquisition; full of interest, the boy hung on Chuck's every word, as if he was trying to assimilate as much information as he could. Even more heartwarming to Blair, though, was Chuck's tiny smile of pride and his hand affectionately rested on Henry's arm.

That small gesture, so doting and yet so delicate, caught Blair's attention just as it had the first time she had seen the picture after having had it printed. It was different from all the tight hugs the previous photographs were packed with; its discretion belonged to a more mature context, and though it spoke about love, it did it showing respect and admiration rather than the sheer, instinctive tenderness of childlike embraces. The first time she had taken the photograph in her hands and noticed this change, Blair had promptly pushed away the feeling that the image of Chuck and Henry absorbed in documents somehow marked another turn in their life.

Now, though, eyeing the photo again with attention, Blair couldn't help but acknowledge every little detail that told her Henry wasn't a kid anymore: the hair he had decided to keep a little long, the ambitious, resolute curiosity of his gaze and that majestic desk which didn't seem to be too big for him as it had before.

Quickly, taken by a sudden need, Blair turned back the pages till she found an older picture of Chuck and Henry in the very same room, both sat at the desk. Eight years old Henry looked so sweet curled up on his chair by Chuck's side. His gaze wasn't directed to the file his father was reading, but to the coloring book settled on his lap; some of its pages, ripped apart to become artistic gifts for Chuck, studded the desk's tabletop, bright stains of purple and red over black marble. The difference between the two shots struck Blair so powerfully that she felt a tight lump in her throat. She remained staring at younger Henry and at the adorable way his lips pursed as he focused for a full minute, before coming back to the last picture of the album.

No drawings brought a joyful chaos to Chuck's desk and no children book was piled up on its side to be reached by the hands of a kid. Still, there was no coldness about the picture; it was obvious that its two protagonists were happy to be in each other's company: there was comfort in the image, a relaxed serenity that made it clear that sitting side by side in that office was a habit that had evolved during the years, but that had never been broken. It came to Blair, as she wiped both nostalgic and happy tears from her eyes, that the photograph was maybe yet another evidence that, though life never slowed down its pace, though it always brought inevitable change, the love she and Chuck had built their family over was immutable.

Henry was the proof of that; in spite of the bigger and smaller revolutions and challenges of adolescence, their home was still his cornerstone.

Just as that reassuring thought crossed her mind, Blair heard the sound of the bedroom doors opening, followed by Chuck's slow footsteps. She quickly closed the album and put it back into its drawer, closing it as fast as she could. Still, she didn't lock the armoire; she remained sat crossed legs on the carpet, staring at her jewelry collection as she waited for the imminent moment she would have heard her husband's voice.

"Was it such a hellish day?" Chuck decided to announce himself with a question that made Blair smile for its obvious arrogance. He clearly thought he had her coping mechanism all figured out; he was genuinely convinced it was in his jewels that she sought for relief when she was feeling down and he wasn't around to lighten her bad mood. The assumption was so self-satisfied, so full of certainty and overall so typically Chuck, that it made a pleased smile rise to Blair's lips: more than by the drawer it was locked into, she thought amusedly, her secret was protected by his vanity.

When she turned to look at him, she found him leaned against the doorjamb, a drink in hand and a smug smirk tilting up the corners of his mouth. "It was worse than hellish," she told him as she stood up. "However," she added, "there's no pain the sight of shimmering beauty can't cure. Diamonds are a girl's best friends."

Stepping over to where she was standing, Chuck rested his half-empty glass of scotch on the island which was in the center of the walk-in closet. "I find it rather unfair that the one who provides the diamonds gets no credit for the relief they bring."

When he reached her, Blair let him lace his arms around her. "You get plenty of credit, Bass," she replied and, as he pulled her closer, she shot him a mischievous look, before reaching out to loosen his tie. She deliberately moved her wrist to side as her fingers worked on the knot, so that the bracelet she was wearing – a pink sapphires and diamonds Harry Winston piece he had gifted her with only the week before, for Valentine's Day – would catch the chandelier's lights and her husband's proud gaze.

Chuck's smirk sharpened as he glanced down to her hand; then, impatient after the day they had spent apart, he leaned in and kissed her deeply, running his hands down to her hips. That slow movement, though, stopped just an inch above the waistline of her skirt. "Weren't you wearing pink this morning?" he asked her doubtful, his gaze scanning the white shirt she had on, a small frown crumpling his forehead.

Blair, who had closed her eyes, snapped them back open and snorted at the sudden, bothersome memory of the dark stains on the blouse's sleeve. "That shirt is ruined," she revealed annoyed. "Jennifer's assistant spilled half a cup of coffee over it. I had to change it."

Chuck sighed, letting go of her for a moment to go back to the glass he had left on the island. "Such a waste of potential," he commented, shaking his head slightly as he grabbed the drink. He brought it to his lips, took a sip of liquor and then added: "I've been looking forward to take it off of you all day long. It was so prim and proper, it deserved to be ripped apart and die for the sake of pleasure."

That shameless revelation didn't catch Blair by surprise, nor it offended her. Actually, it managed to erase that bit of peeve thinking back to the coffee accident had caused her; she couldn't help but smile flattered at his lustful expression – and at the fact the details of her attire had remained vivid in his mind since that morning. "I'm deeply sorry to shatter your erotic fantasy, Chuck," she replied, turning back to the armoire. She cautiously took off the bracelet from her wrist and, with the same attention, she laid it back into its box inside the top drawer. "I can assure you the crime wasn't left unpunished, though," she added as she slid it close. "There were irrevocable consequences."

In a moment she heard a clink – the sound of a glass laid on marble with a little too much energy – and then she felt Chuck's arms trapping her waist again from behind and his avid lips pressed to the side of her neck. "Tell me all about it," he demanded in a low voice tone. "There are no tales I enjoy more than the ones about your cruelty."

Blair took the time to shut the armoire before turning in his embrace. "I will," she promised, her lips curled in a flirtatious smile, as her hand slid up his chest. She grasped the end of his loosened magenta tie and pulled it, forcing him to bow his head and capture her mouth in another short, suggestive kiss; it was only when they parted that, reluctantly, she added: "But that's a story for bedtime."

A somewhat disappointed pout showed on Chuck's face when he pulled away from her. Freeing her from his hold, he took a step back and then, eyeing her with a mix of sympathy and resignation, he let the corners of his lips tilt up in a tiny smile. "I imagine you want to know if I've heard from our son."

The fact that he had anticipated the question she had meant to ask him made Blair giggle. "I phoned him during lunch break, but he was on a shopping tour with daddy," she told him, turning her back on him and pushing her hair to side so that he could unclasp the pearl necklace she was wearing. "He didn't say much."

Chuck's fingers quickly worked on the white gold clasp and, a moment later, the light weight of the pearls fell from Blair's neck into his palm. "He's a teenager," he replied, giving her the collier. His hand immediately went back to her neck and then slithered down under the collar of her shirt; slowly, he started stroking her shoulder. "You can't expect him to be particularly loquacious."

Blair heaved a relaxed sigh and closed her eyes, tilting her head and giving in to the gentle, deliberate pressure of his fingertips massaging her skin. It wasn't until a few seconds later that she realized her husband had avoided to tell her if their son had called him. "Yes," she said, her eyes snapping back open, "but I'm sure he did talk to you."

There was a hint of accusation in her voice – and a tad of unrestrained jealousy. Henry was reserved by nature, and adolescence had indeed added a bit of secrecy to his ways, but Blair was aware he and Chuck still had long chats. Her husband hadn't had the same rigid reaction she had had to Henry's discovery of sex; on the contrary, he had accepted it effortlessly, showing a completely non-judgmental attitude. Blair actually suspected Chuck often welcomed their son's confidences and, though she was secretly relieved by the fact Henry knew he had someone he could talk honestly to, she couldn't help but feeling excluded – and angry at herself for not being able to come to terms with the reality of things as easily.

"He did," Chuck eventually answered, his hand inching to her collarbone in skimming caress. "We had a video-chat during the afternoon. He's great." Chuck concluded his quite vague report by placing a libidinous kiss under her earlobe, as his fingers made their way down in between her breasts.

Just as he started unbuttoning her blouse, though, Blair frowned. Stiffening, she pulled back from him and turned to face him. "Charles," she uttered strictly, shooting him a warning look, "stop it immediately."

Chuck blinked, as if confused. "Stop doing what?" he asked. The way he managed to fake sincere surprise and innocence made Blair roll her eyes impatiently. His falsely puzzled expression was almost as irritating as his sneaky attempt to use sex as a distraction to avoid talking about Henry. "Stop trying to please my wife after the horrible day she had?"

Blair huffed. She didn't reply right away, but she took a step towards the island and reached out to the jewel box, where she kept the few pieces she wore every day. "No," she opened the case and, avoiding his gaze, she let the pearl necklace she still had in hand fall into its velvety nest. It wasn't until she had shut the box again with a loud clack that she raised her eyes on Chuck again. "Stop using sex as a diversion!"

The guiltless expression had faded away from Chuck's face, replaced by an amused – and far more sincere – smirk. "But you do it all the time," he pointed out. "And I gladly indulge your manipulative ways. Plus," he added proudly, "it was working so very well."

It was, he was right; and hadn't she been so determined to find out why he was being so secretive about their son, Blair would have gladly let him steal all of her attention. Unfortunately for him, though, this time her curiosity – and her jealousy – happened to be stronger than her libido. "That's not the point, Chuck! The point is that you're refusing to share the details about your conversation with my son!"

Blair didn't know if it was because of how her voice tone had raised or because of the fact she had referred to Henry in such a possessive way, but her statement managed to erase Chuck's sly smile. He was now staring at her straight-faced and he seemed quite disappointed that his distraction strategy hadn't worked. Sighing, he glanced down and began to undo the tie knot Blair had already loosened. "Look, Blair," he uttered, "I'm not sure you want to know what he called to talk about."

That ambiguous answer was all it took Blair to realize that the gut feeling she had gotten the moment Chuck had eluded her first question was indeed correct: Henry had surely phoned his father to tell him about some "love" adventure he was having. "I can't believe this!" she exclaimed, crossing her arms under her breast. "He's visiting his grandparents. How did he even manage to –" she stopped, unable to bring herself to put her thoughts into words.

"He met her at the party your father threw in his honor the other day," Chuck went straight to the point. A small, proud smile hovered above his lips for a moment, but he promptly repressed it when he met Blair's glower. "I'm afraid that's all I can say, though," he promptly warned her, as he finally took off the tie and left it on the island. "I've already revealed too much."

Blair nervously pursed her lips, well aware that there was no way to convince her husband to share more about the things Henry had told him in confidence. He would have never betrayed his trust that way. "I must know her," she concluded bitterly and immediately started to make a mental list of all the guests that her father might have invited for the occasion. "Daddy is very selective, he has a restricted group of acquaintances and an even smaller group of friends. Not many of them have teenage daughters or nieces. It'll only take a short research to –"

Before she could finish, she felt Chuck's hands squeezing her shoulders. He had closed the distance between them with a couple of rapid steps and he was now standing right in front of her. "Blair, dear," he interrupted her, using the patient, unhurried tone he usually reserved for his attempts to placate her. "You probably do know this young woman, yes, but I wouldn't waste time getting information about her. It's really nothing serious, I can guarantee you that; it's a vacation fling."

Blair scowled. "How is that supposed to make me feel better?" she retorted irritated. The term he had chosen – young woman – had given her the idea that the girl in question was possibly even older than her son and the thought had only managed to aggravate her annoyance. For a moment, she felt the need to exhaust her husband with a number of questions she already knew he wouldn't have answered to, even just to have an excuse to get angry at him and, by doing so, to unleash her frustration – trying his patience like that was, indeed, a system she had often adopted lately.

Yet, something about the way he was calmly smiling down at her stopped her. It was a beautiful caring smile, she realized, one that would have fit perfectly in her collection of rare gentle expressions captured in photographs, and, staring at it, she couldn't help but thinking back to the album she had closed only a few minutes before. As she gazed into her husband's eyes, all of the pictures flashed in her mind: the long tale of their life together, of their family, and of the changes they had gone through – and resisted to.

Chuck's open palms slid down her arms in reassuring strokes. "Henry is responsible," he stated, with the same firm conviction he had showed each time, during those months, he had reminded her of their boy's maturity. "He might be a little precocious, but he's still aware. There's no need to turn something natural and healthy into a problem."

Responsible, precocious, aware; the words her husband had used to describe Henry immediately brought her memory back to the last photo she had carefully observed before Chuck's arrival. Vivid as if it was actually before her eyes, the image finally allowed her to soften her expression, as she welcomed a comforting sense of resignation.

There was no way to stop time from running, Blair told herself, glancing down to her feet as Chuck's hands kept caressing her, delicate and loving; there wasn't even a point in trying to. She had to accept the new turns in Henry's life, every sign telling her that he was becoming less of a child each day, with the certainty that, even through the most challenging swings, she would have never truly lost him, for he was tied to her and Chuck by the most profound love. Her son was a special young man and she was unspeakably proud of him: it was, eventually, the only thing that truly mattered.

"How relieving, Chuck," she commented ironically at last. Though she did her best not to sound pleased, her words were lightened by a slight chortle. "My fifteen years old son is a confirmed womanizer."

Chuck leaned in and placed a kiss on the top of her head. "Try to see it this way," he told her after, the signature smirk back to crease her lips. "As long as he keeps experiencing, you don't have to deal with a daughter in law. I have a feeling I'll have to fill another safe room with jewels to keep you in a good mood and make sure you don't find a way to get rid of the unfortunate girl. It'd be so unpleasant."

Rolling her eyes, Blair heaved an exasperated sigh. Yet, right after, she couldn't help but smile at him – and the way was completely unaware of the kind of gems she was thinking about. "You'd better keep the diamonds coming then, Bass," she said last.

He raised his eyebrows at her. "Don't I always do that?" he asked, pulling her closer.

"You most certainly do," she declared. She covered his proud, self-satisfied smirk with her mouth in a kiss. Chuck Bass truly had no idea exactly how precious his gifts were.

**Author's Note:**

> [1] Some of you might be confused about the title and wondering what a wunderkammer is. A wunderkammer, or cabinet of curiosities, is a place where collectors kept their "wonders". They became extremely popular among aristocracy and monarchies during 1500 and 1600: the "wonder rooms" housed collections that could include pretty much anything precious, rare and exotic: natural objects, books, relics, pieces of art, jewels, antiques.
> 
> [2] I feel some might feel bothered by the fact Henry discovered sex at such a young age. I understand that. This is just my headcanon, I don't mean to offend anyone.
> 
> [3] Details in the story: The story is set in 2030, during February, which makes Henry 15, since in my timeline he was born on September 2014.
> 
> The Ambrosia necklace actually exists - and it is beautiful. Go check on Buccellati website! Also, if you want to get an idea of Blair's armoire, go check on Agresti website!
> 
> There are various references to stories I've already written (the Austrian chalet, for example, which my readers have already met in Journey To Glory), and hints regarding things I might write in the future.
> 
> [4] If you have questions feel free to contact me, either on Twitter (CryWilliams) or Tumblr (22reasonstolove), or through pms!
> 
> [5] English is not my mother language. I'm Italian. I apologize for possible mistakes.


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